Bone looked at the strangely bouncy man's credentials. "Dr. Bowman, welcome to Cross & Bone Inc." He looked at Bowman's aide…a stunning blond girl and raised an eyebrow.
The girl smiled and held out a hand to be shaken, "Dr. Tyler. I'm Doctor Bowman's assistant."
The Doctor cocked a questioning eye at Rose.
Bone grunted, "Turning 'em out young these days?"
Rose sighed, "I've got a PH.D in physics and still I get carded."
Bone nodded. It really wasn't any of his business, and gestured for them to follow him.
"Dr. Tyler?" The Doctor teased. "PH.D in physics?"
"Coruscant University. Double doctorate actually," Rose murmured.
The Doctor blinked, "What's the other doctorate in?"
"Xeno-psychiatry."
"Oh."
"Proud of me?"
"Always!"
They grinned at each other.
Sarah Jane slipped through the door whose lock K-9 had picked. The plan was that of two pronged attack. The Doctor and Rose would come in through the front, Sarah Jane and K-9 in from the back…or the side as it were. She'd find out were they were building the munitions while the Doctor and Rose made distraction. When she found it she'd call them. The Doctor hadn't been thrilled with this plan. But, they knew Sarah Jane. So she couldn't be the distraction.
"Track the weapons, boy," she whispered to her dog.
"AFFIRMATIVE."
"And this is where the guidance systems are assembled. As you can see they are mostly put together by robotics." Mr. Bone said in a monotone.
Rose hoped this wasn't how he talked to Mrs. Bone.
It looked like any other manufacturing plant. It had robotic arms that screwed things into other things. Technicians in blue jumpsuits scurried from one assembly line to the next.
"We're able to produce the safest and most accurate tracking devices in the world market," Bone puffing out his chest in pride.
"The best 'eh?" The Doctor grinned so widely that Bone took a startled step back. "We're the inspectors here so why don't you let us decide that." His grin seemed to expand and encompass the world before Bones close set eyes.
Razzle dropped the remote and stood up. He had been watching a rerun of something called 'Dawson's Creek.' It was angst ridden and full of pretty girls. He was enjoying it until something brushed up against his awareness.
Mr. Cross watched as the boy turned around in ever widening circles.
"What's wrong?" Mr. Cross asked in alarm.
"There is a disturbance in the force!" Razzle came to a stop. "No. Two disturbances." He cocked his head as if listening. The Dark Side whispered to him. "Time…something about time. A man who walks in time but isn't part of it. A storm…the Oncoming Storm! And the others more subtle–like ripples in a pond, younger…female. Flowers and thorns. And howling."
Sarah Jane smiled, "Here we are."
This room was much like the first the, with the robotic arms and scurrying technicians. Only it was screwing together more of those robot things… droidekas, Rose called them. She opened the door and peered in. A round thing that looked a lot like a golf ball as big as a truck hung from the ceiling on metal wires. She had traveled long enough with the Doctor to know when something was bad. And this was bad.
"'Ello, Miss. Smith, fancy meeting you here."
Sarah Jane slowly turned round. Goon-One and Goon-Two smiled at her.
Rose turned around slowly. She tuned out Bone and his deadly dule monologing. She reached out with the Force. Something had been clouding her sight all day. She didn't know what it was but it was pervasive like ink in water. And now the dark obscuing mist parted.
Razzle entered the room, his back straight and stiff with Mr. Cross at his heels. He had to see.
The man out of time…the Time Lord! The Dark Side spoke of a tsunami that swept everything in its path, which changed even the molecules in front of it…; Razzle had thought that he'd be taller.
He found himself looking into the deep brown eyes of a woman who blazed in the Force like a new born star.
"Jedi," Razzle hissed. He had never met one. But, he knew instinctively what one felt like. It was like being hit in the face with a ball of sunlight.
"Sith," Rose said reaching for calm.
The Doctor looked from the boy to Rose. He felt like one of the townsfolk in an old western watching a gunfight waiting for who would draw first. Even the some of the technicians had stopped and were watching the staring match in fasination.
Bone bored on.
Razzle did the one thing his master had suggested was a really bad idea when meeting a Jedi. He ran. Rose followed.
A forklift barred her way. Rose didn't go around; she leapt over the lumbering vehical.
"Oh, that was brilliant!" The Doctor exclaimed.
Razzle took in the many obstacles in-between him and the door and jumped onto a swiveling robot arm.
Bone had finally trailed off when he noticed he didn't have an audience anymore.
"I'll just call security," the rotund gun runner said reaching for his cell phone.
"Don't even think about it," The Doctor plucked the offending phone from his fingers and turned round in time to see Rose swing herself up onto a robotic arm to give chase over the tops of massive machinery.
Rose and Razzle were moving faster than any human should be able to move. The Doctor was torn. He knew this was not possible for humans and it was troubling. It was also just so…cool! Rose just somersaulted over three people and ran half way up a wall!
Razzle dropped onto a conveyer belt, rolled of it and made a beeline to the door. Rose pursued.
Sarah Jane was running from the goons, K-9 at her side. I really need to join a gym was her thought before colliding with the fleeing Razzle. They fell down in a crash of limbs with the young Sith smashing his shins against K-9's metal sides.
Razzle had pulled himself free and was preparing to bolt when his arm was grabbed and twisted around his back.
"You, Darth Brat are trapped between the Black Hole of Nakat and the Magataran Maelstrom," Rose said in his ear.
The Goons thundered around the corner. They saw Sarah Jane, that damn tin dog, and Glinda the kickass witch of the north with trouble in her eye. They stumbled to a stop.
"You two! Take a sick day!" Rose ordered sharply.
The goons didn't think that overtime was compensation enough for dealing with Glinda again so they took her advice, turned and left the building.
"Sarah Jane," Rose asked reflectively.
"Yes."
"Do you still have the blasters in your purse?"
Sarah Jane nodded.
"And it never occurred to you to, I don't know, threaten them with it?"
Sarah Jane blinked, "Not really, no."
Rose sighed.
"My master will destroy you!" Razzle squirmed and tried to pull away.
Rose hung on grimly, "We'll see."